


While They were Innocent

by Myrtilla



Series: While They were Innocent [1]
Category: Being Human
Genre: Attempted Rape/Non-Con, Attempted Sexual Assault, Death in Childbirth, F/F, F/M, M/M, Miscarriage, Murder, Mutilation, Non-Consensual Oral Sex, Non-Graphic Rape/Non-Con, Other, Prequel, Prostitution, Revenge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-13
Updated: 2014-09-21
Packaged: 2018-02-04 12:11:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 6
Words: 10,582
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1778659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Myrtilla/pseuds/Myrtilla
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>1488 AD </p>
<p>"He's beautiful." </p>
<p>Six young women agree to raise their friend's newborn orphan. How will his upbringing and six loving mothers shape one of the world's most dangerous vampires: Lord Henry (Hal) Yorke</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The 7th Mother

**Author's Note:**

> I always wanted to know more about character background stories from Being Human, plus I love history :)  
> This my first attempt at Fanfic and I'd appreciate any feedback.

1488 AD York, England

The echo of drunken laughter drifted up the stairs but failed to completely mask the screams. Elizabeth bit her bottom lip as the lump on top of her grunted and heaved. He shuddered as he came and she emitted a moan of false pleasure, her thoughts focused on the noise from the next room. She extended her palm; the drunk dropped the tin coin on the ground and shuffled back downstairs, adjusting his belt. Elizabeth pulled herself upright, the broken straw mattress prickling her exposed skin. As she pulled her dress back up over her breasts she could feel the bruises forming, fingerprints just visible against her pale skin.

The brothel consisted of two floors; the downstairs tavern and two threadbare bedrooms divided by curtains into the seven stalls where the young women slept and worked. Elisabeth opened the door to the second bedroom. Two girls knelt on the floor holding the hands of a third.

“Lizzy,” groaned the third woman, opening her bloodshot brown eyes.  
One of the others dropped her hand so Elizabeth could take her place.  
“I’m here Cathy,” she whispered. She stroked her sister’s damp black curls and looked across at Jane. “How long has it been?”  
“I don't know, at least twenty hours,” Jane answered.  
“Can’t we give her anything?” Her face so very much like the younger girls’ was lined with fear and pain, wishing she could relieve some of it.  
“Mary, I think there’s some whisky under my mattress,” Jane said to the other girl standing behind Elisabeth. Little Mary hurried out of the room, her blond braids bouncing off her shoulders.

At thirteen she was a full three years younger than Catherine, the next in line, and sheltered by her six ‘sisters’ from what they could. Although her virtue had been compromised before her first bleeding had occurred her innocence still hadn't been completely worn away. Mary had not spoken through the labor, unable to think of anything except her own mother torn apart by a child that claimed both their lives.  
“Lizzy,” Jane kissed Catherine’s forehead and stood up. Elizabeth saw beads of blood forming in her palm as she withdrew from Catherine's grasp. The two women moved a few feet away.

“We have to be prepared, Lizzy…” Whispered Jane. “I…”  
Jane’s breasts still leaked for want of her own child, a small and sickly daughter. The child had not survived her first night and left the world unnamed. Jane had already accepted reality.  
“The doctor-”  
“She needs a priest,” Jane interrupted. Mary reappeared carrying the bottle. Jane pressed it into Lizzy’s hands.  
“We won’t be long,” she wrapped an arm around Mary’s shoulders and led her away.  
Catherine took a shaky mouthful as Elizabeth settled knelt beside her again.  
“I wish I could have given you a better life,” she whispered, choking back tears. “We should have found the father, some money at least…”  
“I don’t know who it was. And who would listen to an uneducated whore?” Cathy laughed weakly. “But it doesn't matter. I’ll save every penny for the rest of my life, get her a dowry. Just think Lizzy, she might be butchers wife, or a blacksmith’s…”  
“She?”  
“I always wanted a doll,” Catherine mused, “I’ll have one soon-she’s coming!”  
Elizabeth moved to her sister’s feet, hitching her skirt up to her waist. The baby was crowning.

“Jane, come back! Agnes! Maude! Anne-” she called desperately, without any idea of what to do.  
“Support the head,” groaned Catherine.  
The head slowly emerged, the small patch of hair jet black. Elizabeth cradled the fragile skull, catching the torso and then legs in her other hand. As the cord was severed it began to cry.  
“Is she alright?” gasped Catherine.  
“He’s beautiful Cathy.” Elizabeth placed the baby on her chest.  
“Oh…he is.” She smiled and freed her breast. The healthy baby began to suckle.

A boy is better than a girl, Elizabeth thought. A man can learn a trade and earn an honest living but the options for a woman are seamstress or whore. If I’d been a man I might have protected you better….

“What do you want to call him?”  
“Henry,” she replied after a pause. “You’ll protect us one day, won’t you, little man?” she kissed his head and closed her eyes.  
The door opened to reveal Agnes, Maude and Anne.  
“Oh my,” Anne choked and began to sob. Maude wrapped her arms around her, her own eyes dry but bottom lip beginning to tremble.  
“Elisabeth, look…” Agnes pointed shakily.

As she glanced down Elizabeth saw the hem of her dress was soaked in blood.  
“Cathy! Please, no, God no!” she grabbed her sister’s shoulders and shook her, half blinded by tears. As Catherine’s arms slackened the baby began to slip. A small pair of hands caught him and whisked him away. The baby began to cry again and Mary rocked him, gently crooning like a mother bird.  
Jane joined the group by the door. “He refused. He said he would never set foot in a whorehouse.”

“Mary, let him finish feeding,” Elizabeth heard herself say.  
Mary knelt and angled the baby against his mother’s still warm body and placed her nipple in his mouth. After the first breast was used she unraveled the other. The baby suckled as if nothing had changed. After he was satisfied he snuggled against Mary’s small breast and gurgled.  
“We can’t keep him.”  
The five girls all turned to Agnes. She shifted uncomfortably and focused on Elizabeth.  
“I’m not going to kill him. I have to be his mother now.” She tried to close her sister’s eyes but the lids resisted her fingers. Unable to look at her face any longer Elizabeth pulled the blanket over her.  
“I’m sorry but you know we can’t afford a wet nurse. It’s been a miracle none of us have had had children sooner-”  
“Are you saying it was a miracle that my daughter died?” Jane challenged icily.  
“No, that’s not what I meant-”  
“I still have milk.”  
“But for how long, Jane?”  
She shrugged. “At least until we can hire a wet nurse.”

We?” Elizabeth looked up with gratitude.

Jane nodded and Elizabeth rose to embrace her.

“It’ll be easier if we work together,” said Maude.  
“I know what I would want if it was my child,” Anne said, nodding. “So four mothers, no five. Sorry Mary.”  
“Six,” corrected Agnes. “Of course…I’m sorry. Can I hold him…?”  
Mary gave the baby up with reluctance and he whined in protest.  
“I was so afraid to say anything last month,” she whispered. “But I suppose nature made the choice for me…”  
“Oh my,” Jane placed her hand on Agnes’s shoulder. “How far along?”  
“Two months, barely formed.”  
The baby continued to sob.  
“Here, he could still be hungry,” Jane began unlacing her dress.  
Elizabeth kissed Catherine’s forehead through the cheap woolen sheet.  
“He’ll be a good man. I promise.”


	2. The Two Sided Coin: Justice and Revenge

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Becoming a vampire doesn't change your personality. That’s just a little lie we tell the newcomers to help them through their first few kills. It doesn't change the personality; it liberates it. 
> 
> Killers are both born and made. The moment Hal became a murderer

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The quote in the summary is from S2 but seemed appropriate here too :)

(1494)

 

Becoming a vampire doesn't change your personality. That’s just a little lie we tell the newcomers to help them through their first few kills. It doesn't change the personality; it liberates it.

 

 

Death had always been the strongest aphrodisiac. Survival unlocked the instinctive urges although human beings rarely considered creating life as they succumbed to base desires. The pestilence that once again plagued London had not yet reached York and that was a cause for celebration.

From her position by the door of the tavern Agnes saw three men picking their way down the crouched street. Their clothes suggested middle class status, the foolish young heirs with tin to spare. Based on their gait only one was sober but both looked confused. Perhaps the whore district was not their intended destination.

She nodded to Anne and approached them; Anne quietly detached the child from her skirts and followed.  Jane and Maude emerged to take their places.

“Feeling lonely mi-lord?” she simpered with a smile.

Two of the drunks watched eagerly as she flipped her shawl back over her shoulders, revealing naked breasts. Her nipples were firm from the icy night air.

“No thank you,” answered the third man curtly, eyes fixed inches above her head. “Not my preference.” 

“Arthur…” groaned his friend.  

Anne swept past Agnes and draped her arms around the man called Arthur’s neck, kissing him full on the mouth. He recoiled and tried to push her off.  As she released him Anne smiled and took the hand of one of the drunks. The man followed readily, allowing her to lead him inside.

“Charles, I would like to leave now-”

“How about you?” Agnes asked the other man, cutting off Arthur.  “Or are you both in favor of more…manly pursuits?”

She had not anticipated the blow to her face and staggered; a second to her stomach winded her, knocking her to the ground.

“Fucking bitch,” grunted the man called Charles, speaking for the first time.

She fought the instinctive surge of panic as the man straddled her. One fleshy hand cupped her breast, pinching the already bruised nipple.

Agnes bit her lip hard enough to draw blood as her skirt was lifted. Obediently she opened her thighs.   .

His companion watched with a silent smirk as Charles positioned himself. 

A solid weight connected with his shoulder sending him sprawling onto his face, moving quickly to his shoulders. Small knees planted either side of his neck and he felt the ends of the kerchief about his neck twist and tighten. He gagged, flailing behind him with his hands trying to the attacker sitting on his back.

“Get it off me!” he croaked.

The other man caught hold off the boy’s thin shoulders. The child snarled and snapped at the man’s fingers.

Desperately Charles rolled onto his back, crushing and grinding the smaller body beneath him into the ground. He scrambled to his feet as the grip loosened. The child struggled to rise but a foot planted on his small chest was enough. With pleasure he brought the other foot down on the brat’s face, crushing the delicate nose. 

He didn't cry. With a soft grunt of pain he raised his eyes to meet the grown man’s eyes, the large, dark ovals reflecting anger but not fear, the hateful intensity abnormal in a child’s gaze.  He grimaced and raised his foot again.

“Charles…”

He looked up. His friend’s face had grown pale, hands clenched in fists by his sides.

The first whore was still on the ground, a second woman stood beside Arthur holding a blunt kitchen knife to his throat.

“Get back,” Maude hissed.

“You wouldn't dare, cunt.”

Arthur yelped as she pressed the blade deeper into his throat. A single bead of blood blossomed against his pasty skin. As it dripped down his neck another took its place.

“Fine!” Charles released the boy. “Now let him go!”

“Agnes,” said Maude calmly. “Take Hal back inside.”

“Mother-”

“Now!”

The little boy clambered to his feet and holding the broken pieces of his nose. The first whore took his hand and led him back to the brothel.

Maude turned her attention to the other man. From her position against his back she felt the dampness. He had pissed himself.

Maude was fearful of removing the knife.

“You, drop your coat on the ground and turn around,” she ordered. To the other, “Pick it up and tie his hands. Use the sleeves.”

The two men obeyed.

“Lie on your face.”

“Now,” she addressed her hostage.   “Nothing comes for free in this world but I will give you a bit of advice this one time. If I ever see you again I will not hesitant to cut off your prick and feed it to you.”

She removed the blade from his neck and brought the blunt handle on his head.

………………………………………….

“Maude, what have you done?”

“I did what was needed. I protected our son and reminded a man that we are more than dirt under his heels. I would rather ask what you did, Jane.” 

Mary nodded gently stroking Hal’s dark curls, her eyes fixed on a point in the corner of the room.

 The child lent his head back against her shoulder, clutching a bloodstained handkerchief to his nose. Jane suppressed a dry sob at the sight.

“It was an empty threat-” Jane began desperately.

“Only they need to believe it,” Maude interrupted her black eyes blazing.

Jane sighed, pushing a copper stand being her ear. Maude’s fierce courage was a trait to be respected and feared. Like her namesake, the long dead, Empress Maude her nature held potential for so much more than a simple whore.

Elizabeth had once shared that fire. Jane knew how she had borne years of abuse from her father. It had only stopped the day she put a knife between his shoulders for daring to touch her little sister. Sweet naive Catherine…

“I’m fine to go back,” Agnes said firmly, cutting off a protest from Maude. “Jane?”

Jane followed her out into the night. As she made to adjust her dress she realized she had forgotten to cover herself upon coming inside.

“Where are they?” Jane said softly.

“Worked himself free or the other woke up. Either way, gone.”  

 Agnes had already regained her composure, all emotion locked away once more.  Like Jane she had been born to a family of too many daughters, the unlucky ones not quite pretty enough to make a profitable marriage sold into prostitution.

It was Anne who was the true beauty; a delicate doll of a woman with her porcelain skin and emerald eyes. If her family had not been taken during the Great Plague of London she would have married well. But as an orphan without a dowry her beauty had condemned her. 

And finally Mary. With her frequent spells of self-inflicted muteness the young woman attracted the wrong kind of men that they no longer could protect her from.

They were all very different women forced together by shared hardship and now their beautiful son.

“We are a family,” she said aloud, more to herself then to Agnes. “I don’t want to lose anyone else.”

 

……………………………………….

The street was crowded, people bustled by immersed in peaceful haggles and heated arguments over the poor quality goods. Hal watched as Jane led her client out of sight. The lines of twisted stalls and numerous narrow alleyways were by the more modest prostitutes, however performing sexual services in the street was not unusual.

_“Wait here,” Jane had told him._  

He placed his back against the ally wall behind him, watching the strangers pass him by. Very few had had time or tin for beggars.

Hal lightly stroked his slightly crooked nose, flinching at the pain. A polished pair of boots appeared in front of him.  

“Spare a penny, sir?”

“How would you like a whole shilling?”

“Thank you sir,” Hal replied, holding out the weather beaten cup.

“Steady now, look at me boy.”

Hal raised his head fully. His pretty angelic face had served him fairly well begging in the past, the newly broken nose stirred sympathy rather than marring him.

“Well this city is smaller than I thought.”

An eerily familiar leer twisted across the man’s face. Hal drew back with horror as he recognized him. Strong fingers roughly grabbed his hair, holding the child on his knees.

“I believe you owe me an apology, don’t you agree, little bastard?” Arthur asked, his voice in a soft resemblance of care. With his free hand he loosened his trousers, pulling them down to his knees.

Hal stared at the soft prick and fleshy sacks dangling limply inches from his face. He was reminded unpleasantly of the cheap meat on the butcher’s stand, raw, mangy cuts surrounded by hopeful flies.

No one was going to help him.  Still he struggled in the man’s grip. He froze as he saw the glint of a dagger.

“You see this?” The man growled holding the tip of the blade an inch from the boy’s left eye.

Hal nodded silently.

“If you move I will push this into your eye. Understand?”

“Yes.”

“Open your mouth,” he ordered.

Hal obeyed slowly.

With a smile Arthur thrust his organ into the boy’s mouth. 

“I assume your mother has taught you what to do,” he sneered.

 Hal fought the impulse to gag as he began to suck.  He looked up at the man to see his eyes were closed. As it hardened the man began to groan, his fingers tugging Hal’s hair the grip on the dagger hilt slipping. Hal waited, feeling the approach to orgasm. As the final gush spurted into his mouth he acted. Wrenching the hilt from his assailant’s hand he bit down, tearing diagonally with his teeth.

The scream of pain was accompanied by another flood of warm fluid, blood. Hal crawled backwards, blood and something else dripping down his chin.

He watched the man writhe on the ground clutching his bleeding member. The end of the shaft hung partially severed, connected only by a shed of flesh. 

He began to back up into the alley. The wounded man struggled to his feet cursing, clutching his groin with one hand and clawing at Hal’s face with the other.

The dagger was still clutched in Hal’s hand and he brandished it wildly. The chance swipe of the blade caught the man’s hand, drawing another shout of pain and, as he drew back the injured hand, opened a window in his defense.

Leaping to grab a fistful of hair and drag his opponent within better reach, Hal brought the blade across Arthur’s throat in one jagged motion. 

The man crumpled to his knees, bringing both hands reaching to his throat in an attempt to interrupt the flow of blood.  His face was growing pale, mouth open but unable to speak. Hal threw away the weapon, landing deliberately out of the dying man’s reach and stepped past him.

Hal knelt to retrieve the man’s fallen purse and spat out the last of the liquids in his face. As he fled into the uncaring crowd, it now proved to be a shield. A child splattered with blood could still slip unseen through the talking cattle.

…………………………………………

Jane smoothed down her skirts, tucking the payment coin between her breasts.

“Hal?” she scanned the crowd, fighting her rising feeling of hysteria. Abandoning her post, she pushed through then crowd calling desperately.

_Should never have left him alone. There was blood on the ground…_ she tried to silence her terrified mind.

As she saw him kneeling by another shop she felt a surge of relief, temporally overcoming her anger. She watched him trace markings in the dirt with his index finger, mouthing the words as he did so. Although they could only afford to send him to the small school three days a week the child was already more literate than all his mother’s combined. He flourished in their pride as he formed words they could not read. 

“You mustn't wander off again,” she said, attempting to sound stern. “Darling, are you listening?” she sighed.

“I’m sorry,” he said, looking up at her.

Jane gasped.

“Hal, what happened to you?”

She beckoned and the child climbed into her arms. The tears he had withheld finally began to flow, mingling with the dried substances.

As Hal wrapped him thin arms around her neck she recognized both the familiar scents; the blood not strong enough to overpower the other. 

“I’m so sorry, so sorry,” she murmured.


	3. Unraveling Seams

Evil is always devising more corrosive misery through man's restless need to exact revenge out of his hate.

(Ralph Steadman)

 

Jane stirred and stretched her cold limbs.

The clang of church bells never failed to be heard throughout the town, distant noise even reaching the crumpled houses of the poor districts. The monotonous drone bore the same stubborn, repetitive views of the faithful: eternal damnation to harlots such as herself. She smirked without humour.

There was something different to the drone of the bells. A wedding or a funeral was in process this morning. The two events which marked the anticipation of new life and the end of one.

Hal’s small body shifted closer to her own. He emitted a soft groan, twining his fingers through her hair. Jane ran a gentle finger down his cheek. His nose was still tender but had maintained most of the original shape. 

Hal had not spoken of what had befallen him the day before. She was still unsure of what depth he had been violated or whether he was able to comprehend it.

After a short spell of crying the child had stayed docile and an unspecified emotion somewhere between anticipation, dread and calm; unnatural for a boy who flinched to see a mutt kicked.  He had chosen silence and pretense as a frail defense.

Just like Mary...

_The soft whine escaping Mary’s lips resembled a wounded dog rather than a woman’s;  grinding her knuckles into her eyes, thumbs pressed into her ears as crouched on the floor. Even outside her short terms of fear and anxiety the girl’s eyes wandered, her mind too not seeming to be focused on the present._

_However she refused to say what terrors of her past troubled her mind. All Jane was able to do was cage Mary in her arms until the soft shaking stopped_

“Jane?”

She looked up. The curtain separating her mattress from Anne’s was pulled back, the younger woman’s face peeking around the gap.

“Can we talk?”

Jane rose quietly. Hal shifted in his sleep, feeling for the warmth her body had left.

Seven years of nights spent in whichever bed was free had trained the little boy’s mind to ignore the nearby grunts and heavy breathing of clients, sometimes only separated by a thin sheet of material.

“Is something wrong?” Jane asked as they sat in the small kitchen.

“There wasn't a good time to say these last few days,” Anne began hesitantly. Her beautiful face was marred by dark shadows and dents in her hands from her anxious nails.

“Someone asked me to marry him.”

Anne allowed a moments’ silence before continuing.

“He is a butcher. I've seen him regularly these last few months.”

“When did this happen? Have you accepted?” Jane asked, finding her voice at last.

“He told me he would wait for a few days, so I could consider…There is some goodness in him…”

The acceptance of marriage was only a formality; this man already knew the answer to his request. It was not unheard of for a man to buy a favoured prostitute through marriage, to have her in his bed whenever he chose and not be required to share with other men.

Marriage is a deal made over pleasures of the flesh and material gain. Love did not play a part.

Jane knew what her friend wanted to hear at this moment. Jane longed to feel betrayal and resentment and if that failed to feel happy for her. She felt nothing.

“Be thankful for your good fortune, you have a chance to escape a life none of us ever wanted,” Jane laid her hand over Anne’s.

“Marry him tomorrow, before he changes his mind.”

“There was one condition. I never come back here which means after my wedding I won’t be able to see Hal again.”

Jane withdrew her hand.

“Jane please, I need you to understand how difficult this is for me! I remember what we all promised Lizzie but-”

“Please don’t insult me. Of course I understand but it is still my duty to decide what is best for our son. Don’t speak, just nod.”

Jane stood up.

“I am going to take Hal out of the house for a few hours, enough time for you to gather your belongings and tell everyone what you told me. When we return you will be gone. None of us will know where you have gone and Hal will be distraught but Elizabeth, Maude, Agnes, Mary and I will be there to comfort him. You are going to kiss him goodbye and act perfectly normal so his last memory of you will be happy. Do you understand?”

Anne nodded and Jane turned to go back upstairs.

“Would you just give me a few minutes alone first? Please….”

The clench in her friend’s timid voice was enough to make Jane pause but not enough to deserve empathy.

“Very well,” came the curt reply.

Once alone Anne laid her head on her arms and wept.

She had the chance for a better life and children who could be kept safe and fed without the shameful brand of illegitimacy. This knowledge only served to reawaken another danger. She was twenty four years without conceiving any children and she feared barrenness above all else.

_What man would keep a cheap woman as his wife if he failed in the basic purpose of women?_

……………………………………………………………….

The faithful bustling through the cathedral doors to the monotonous drone of bells, held their disapproving heads high as Jane and Hal passed. Although Jane wore a kerchief around her head, covering her hair, a simple signal that she was not working, the judgmental eyes still found her as if she were naked.

Jane wondered how many of the men bustling into church pews on Sunday morning would spend other nights of the week in brothels with their trousers around their knees.

“Don’t look at them, darling,” Jane whispered.

Jane had not cared about the church since the night seven years before when a priest had refused to hear a young mother’s confession as she lay dying.

Jane stopped outside one of the smaller churches. Ignoring the squat stone building, she led Hal into the small cemetery.  It was at the far end where the poorest, sinners and unbaptized babies were buried, grew a large hedge of blackberries. Hal’s small face lit up with pleasure at the sight. Jane untied her kerchief and handed it to him.

“Go pick some.”

The delicious wild berries were a rare treat; the only reason someone else hadn't picked them already was a sense of guilt at taking food from a graveyard. 

Jane wandered through the tarnished wooden graves. Somewhere here Hal’s real mother was buried, a simple wooden cross with her name scratched across the surface had been all they could afford.  Even in death people were separated by classes, during plague outbreaks hundreds of poor people were buried in mass graves or burned to stop further infection.

Across the dirt path separating the pauper graves from the wealthier two young men stood by a fresh grave. The preacher had already finished and a grave digger was shoveling the rapidly shrinking earth over the body.

One of the men sensed her gaze and turned. As their eyes locked she felt a sense of recognition that she couldn't place and dropped her head. As she started back towards Hal she stole a glance over her shoulder at them. They were talking softly, the first man pointing questionably at her before looking past at Hal’s crouching form. At that moment the child stood up and turned, the smile on his face disappearing as his eyes fell upon the men.

As the men abandoned the grave and started walking after her Jane remembered their faces. One had been the man who attempted to rape Agnes less than a week before, the other his drunken companion.

Jane grabbed Hal’s hand and dragged him with her towards the gate. Jane felt a strong arm lope around her neck. She dropped Hal’s hand, struggling and clawing at the man’s face. The man grunted and used his other hand to cover her mouth and nose, increasing the pressure on her throat with the other arm.

Jane’s struggles weakened as the scene before her eyes faded to black.

………………………………………

Charles dropped the whore as she stopped moving.

“Where did the stupid kid go?” he said to George.

“In the blackberries,” he grunted. “I can’t reach in there.” 

Charles knelt beside him. The plant was overgrown and unruly, the gaps not wide enough to fit his arm without being snagged by thorns. He could just make out a small pair of shoes and the brown of clothing.

George stood up brushing damp grass of his knees. “We should just burn it.”

“Are you mad? The leaves are wet, it would take too long.”

“Have you dropped something, sir?” came a curious voice.

The gravedigger had finished and was standing behind them.

“Give me that shovel and go.”

The man’s eyes shifted from the Charles to the unconscious woman and back twice before laying down the shovel and walking away.

Charles lifted it above his head, bringing it down. The blunt metal blade tangled against the thorny vines. He raised it again with all his strength. The second stroke broke through the vines with slight resistance but rewarded with a crunch. There was no cry of pain.

Charles pulled his sleeve to cover as much of his hand as possible and gingerly pushed apart the gap the shovel had made. Lying on the muddy ground he saw a pair of shoes, turned on the sides and an overlarge coat rolled up quickly to form the shape of a small child curled into a ball.   

“Little bastard. There’s nothing there!”

Charles took hold of his hair, fingers tugging on the pale strands as he clenched his teeth. George laid a hand on his shoulder, wishing he knew what to say.  He shoved the hand away.

His best friend had been found murdered and…injured…in an ally just two days after they had been threatened by a whore over breaking that child’s nose. While he clung to that sole link as if it were a lifeline there was a deeper reason for his grief. The day that men were bested in any form by women marked the end to the rightful places of society. It was as much an assurance of his own position as a man to avenge the death as sorrow for the loss. Wrath had to delivered...

“Do we have any wine left?”

“Why?”

“Trust me.”

On the other side of the hedge, knelt Hal. He tasted his own blood as the fist shoved against his mouth dripped onto his tongue. More small cuts covered his face. He didn't dare move and wipe them away.

 


	4. Inspired Demons

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As Anne accepts her chance of escape with bittersweet emotions, Jane pays for the crimes of others

_"Such as we are made of, such we be_

(William Shakespeare) 

 

Tears marked clean streaks down Maude’s cheeks as she embraced her closest friend. Anne cried anew as she buried her face in curve of the taller woman’s neck.

Maud’s callused hands gripped Annie’s slender shoulders and waist, shaking slightly. In close to a decade Anne had never seen this woman cry.

_Two days past fifteen she was late in joining the brothel, she knew Agnes, the eldest, had been penetrated the first time at twelve years; Elizabeth had been younger still._

_The nameless man’s large hands had been rough and dirty as they weighed her breasts, his breath hot on her skin as he nipped one delicate nipple. A layer of grime formed over her chest as her sweat combined with the dried dust and dirt._

_She winced at the sight of stiff prick framed with knotted hair. The hardened tip brushed her thigh as the man positioned himself above her and Anne fought the instinctive impulse to close her legs._

_Blood blossomed on her bottom lip as she bit down against the pain, a stronger trickle running down the inside of her thighs._

_Once blessedly alone, she drew her knees to her chin and wept._

_She flinched as she felt a hand on her shoulder but as the unknown’s arms encircled her shoulders, she huddled into them, no longer caring who held her. The arms were thin like hers but lined with wiry muscle. Anne buried her face in the other girl’s shoulder, her chin pressing into her breast as her mother once held her._

_Once her tears subsided to throaty rasps the arms released her, hands with equally rough skin yet delicately gentle replaced her clothing. She allowed the blood to be wiped from her legs, not wishing to touch her own body._

_“Please,” Anne croaked, holding out her arms like a child._

_The girl hesitated a moment before sitting beside her once more and enfolding the other in her arms._

_She uttered no words of comfort; there were none that would make the pain and humiliation go away; no reassurances that someday it would be better. All she could offer was understanding and a few precious moments of decency and quiet..._

“I’m going to miss you so much.”

The words felt rudely inaccurate to express her gratitude but she found no better verbal expression.

The man who would soon be her husband cracked his knuckles impatiently.

“Tell them, I’m...”

“Shh, I know,” Maude held her at arm’s length. “And they do too, or they will.”

The pain of seeing the same sense of betrayal on Elizabeth, Agnes and Mary’s faces was not lessoned by this reassurance or the knowledge that she would have felt the same if fate had exchanged their places.

Only Maud had wished her well and accompanied her to the outskirts of their poor district.  

“Don’t let him get bored of you. Promise me?”

Anne nodded and removed Maude’s hands from her shoulders, taking then in her own.

“If it weren’t for you I would have swallowed lye ten years ago. Don’t move,” Anne shifted her stance so Maude’s body blocked hers from view.

She raised herself to plant a chaste kiss on Maude’s lips, using her tongue to pry open the other’s mouth.

 Maude’s body stiffened in surprise for a moment before relaxing in to the kiss.

“Why...?” Maude whispered as Anne pulled away.

“I couldn’t not know what that would feel like. If it would feel any different on with someone I...care about.”

“Was it?” Maude had to ask.

Anne’s response was to embrace her once more and turn away, her eyes swollen red but with no more tears left to shed.

“Goodbye Annie,” Maude let her own tears continue silently, refusing to wipe them away for fear of smudging the last shred of Anne’s scent from her skin. 

..........................................

 

The worn material of the whore’s dress tore easily after he made the first cut. As he moved her body to pull the garment off her shoulders, her naked breasts pressed against him. Charles twisted a makeshift cord to bind the woman’s hands.

He dragged her to the nearest headstone, bending her arms backwards over her head.

Her eyelids had begun to flicker, the discomfort in her arms and the stone grinding into her back was only a small taste.

The wooden crosses on the commoners graves were too damp to be used as fuel but with more cloth wrapped around the end it formed a proficient torch.

The woman was attempting to free her arms, struggling for a solid grip on the sodden grass in order to lift her arms higher. Charles chuckled at the fruitless attempts, halting her with his boot on her stomach.

There was fear in her small hazel eyes, quickly giving way to quiet resignation.  With a barely audible sigh, she spread her legs and closed her eyes.

Charles eyed the pitiful sight, admiring the way her body quivered in anticipation for him to enter her.  Just like the other whore reduced now to her natural position. Arthur may not have appreciated what ways best to use a woman but Charles was sure he would still be able to see the beauty of complete submission.

George reappeared from the carriage, a bottle a little under a third full of blood coloured drink.

 “I need kindling.”

“Have you forgotten? There’s nothing here.” George slurped a swig of wine. “How much you light a fire anyway?”

Charles ignored him and slipped a hand behind the whore’s head, freeing her hair. The long strands were slightly greasy but dry.

“Please don’t,” she begged. Even the poorest of common women wore their hair long; absence of hair was a sign of disease.

Charles stuffed his folded handkerchief into her mouth before taking handful and pulling taunt.

The whore released a single whimper as three rough strokes of the knife broke the fragile tresses, falling like autumn leaves onto her chest and stomach.

The knife blade slowly traced a tear on her cheek, dragging down her body. As the blade stopped just below her belly button he let go; the blade pointed towards the triangle of hair between her thighs.

Charles took the bottle from George and smashed the top against another gravestone.

“Hey, don’t waste it!” exclaimed George angrily.

Paying no attention, Charles selected the largest piece of glass broken glass and placed the bottle on the ground.

“I’ve never done this before,” he thought aloud rather than spoke. Nether his foolish friend or the illiterate whore would have heard of the unusual man from Vinci who had discovered this trick.

It took several moments for him to find the correct angle, angling the weak sunlight and reflecting onto the handful of hair.

He cried out with triumph as a thin whip of smoke formed bringing with it an appalling burning smell. A few drops of wine encouraged a small flame into life.

“If it starts to burn out feed it more wine.”

George nodded, awe painted across his wide face.

Charles knelt between the woman’s legs and instructed George to hold her ankles. With one hand he spread her dry opening, the other gripped his knife.

Her eyes widened in horror and she began to struggle. A lucky kick freed her left leg, thrashing desperately as her panic overpowered reason.

Charles seized her failing leg and helped George hoist her off the ground and allow her own violent movements to drain her strength. After less than three minutes her body was rendered limp with exhaustion.  George positioned her legs on his shoulders with the ankles crossed beside his hips, keeping her body elevated to make any further struggles taxing effort.  

Muffled groans and dry sobs accompanied the first cut; George grimaced as blood and thin fragments of tender flesh fell onto his shirt.

Charles wiped his brow, laying down the knife and retrieved the torch. Carefully avoided the sharpened edges he poured the remaining wine over the cloth end and immersed it in the small fire. The greedy flames licked up the alcohol and grew stronger.

He felt a smile lift the corners of his mouth as he lined the burning above her bloodstained cunt.

“Please, just...kill...me.”

He glanced down at her face. She had worked the gag loose leaving a beard of spit staining her chin.

The scream was only background noise failing to block out the hiss of cooking meat.

..........................................

 

Maude’s face had regained none of its natural colour, her skin pale with red blotches almost as if in the early stages of plague. However, she was confident that if she spoke her voice would be steady and calm.

Her life had more often consisted of a battle to remain alive rather then living or possessing anything worth protecting. Choices, preferences, opinions and even feelings of love were luxuries not within her reach but she allowed herself the decision to never fully reveal the torment of her grief and weakness.

_How long will her bed be empty?_

There would always be women without any other choice for survival, the pretty ones yearning a living while others who served only as a body to be filled would manage to delay death another day.

Her eyes remained directed to the filth covered road as she walked, hoping for a few hours’ sleep before the brothel opened in the evening.

The streets were always dirty; strewn with discarded chamber pots and animals’ leavings, stray cats and dogs wandering freely in hope of finding a rat careless enough to creep outside the houses.

She lifted a foot over a pool of blood, eyes following the trail the last few yards to the tavern door.

“My god,” Maude gasped.

A naked body lay sprawled and broken on the threshold, littered with bruises and torn skin but most horrifyingly a steady flow of blood from the upper thighs.

Elizabeth and Mary appeared in the doorframe, a basket slung over Lizzie’s arm.

“Maude, what-Jane!” she threw herself to the ground amid the grime and gently lifted Jane’s head as Maude turned her to her side.

Jane groaned but did not open her eyes.

“What happened to her?” Elizabeth sobbed desperately.  

Maude knew the last images of her sister would be painted behind Elizabeth’s eyes. Mary stood still, her eyes fixed on the bruised face of the woman who had taken over from her mother.

“Mary!” Maude shouted. “Keep Hal inside.” _Do not let him see this_

_Too late..._ Mary’s lower lip trembled as she pointed.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Leonardo Da Vinci was supposedly the first to use glass and reflected sunlight to make fire. If the rest of the science wouldn't work please forgive me.


	5. Impossible Truths

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 1502-1514
> 
> True psychics are rarer than the supernaturals they claim to contact....
> 
> Mary does not see the world as others do. What phantoms have forced her to maintain her long term silence?

 

The walls of the narrow room had not moved; it was the unquiet emptiness which pressed in on her like a solid weight.

Mary resumed her position, tucking her knees beneath her chin and crossing her ankles and wrists. She glanced quickly at the corner but  the phantom was still there. She wore the same shift in which she had died, the short piece of material riding up her legs as she knelt beside Elizabeth. 

Catherine watched her with sympathy but knew better than to try and comfort her;  she had learned that her skin felt like ice to Mary’s living flesh and it frightened her to hear her voice.  She wished for some explanation why only Mary could see her, only Mary could feel her touch.

She heard Elizabeth groan as she sat up in bed, rolling down her sleeves to cover her  arms.  The rash began on her hands and snaked up her arms, beginning to show on her face. When she moved the fatigue was evident in her stiffened limbs.  She didn't feel the head of curls, so very like her own, now nestling against her shoulder.

Elizabeth blinked twice as if confused before rising to her feet as the door creaked open.

The soft voices drifted past her ears, aware only of Elizabeth’s sobs before she stepped onto the narrow stairs, closing the door behind her.

A hand settled on her shoulder as he sat on the floor behind her. Hal’s practiced arms pulled her against his chest, her head fitting smoothly into the grove of his shoulder and his chin securing her twitching head.

Mary ran her finger over the thin scars on his forearms, drawn with his own nails and teeth eight years earlier.  Even after Jane’s body had been removed the boy had remained seated outside among the blood, piss and other filth. As Agnes tried to move him he clawed her face, smearing his own blood with hers. For three days he had crouched there, refusing food or water until he collapsed with fatigue.

“Just think Mary,” he murmured. “In two days’ time I’ll be at sea. Perhaps one day the West Indies.”

Hal’s joy at being accepted as a deckhand had given them all a sense of pride but all Mary could feel was despair. She wound her fingers into his shirt and sobbed. The body she pressed herself against had developed into a man’s.

“Please tell him the truth,” Catherine whispered. It wasn't the first time she had asked. “He deserves to know who I was.”

Mary longed to block her ears but didn't want to let go.

“Take care of Elizabeth. I love you.”

As he tried to stand she whimpered, digging her nails through the material into his skin.

“There is something I want to give you,” Mary said, her voice husky from years without use. “Something I was never offered.”

It was the first time he had heard her speak.

Mary shifted to her knees so their heads were level.

“What do you mean-” his voice was cut off by the unexpected kiss.

“Please this is wrong,” He attempted to pry off her arms.

“I am not your mother although I have wished I was.” Mary placed a finger to his lips, cutting off further protests. “Don’t speak.”

Hal allowed the woman’s hands on his shoulders to push him gently to the floor as she straddled his hips.  He moaned in surprise as her hand slipped down his slacks, stroking him to full hardness.

She pulled his trousers down to his knees and adjusted her position, riding him slowly with eyes fixed on his. Hal swallowed nervously, confused by the not unpleasant feelings stirred by the sensation.

Mary sighed as she felt the release, adjusting to lie atop his body for a final kiss.

Hal’s cheeks were flushed as struggled out from underneath her and replaced his clothing. Mary fell back onto the mattress closing her eyes.

“How could you?”

From the moment she had snatched the bloodstained baby in her arms many years ago, Mary had been haunted by the image of his now long-dead mother in the form of a apparition no one else could see. Yet still she thought that if she were to be plagued with hallucination she wished it could have been Jane; the woman who had become so much more than her friend.

Although the six maidens had shared Hal as their child and called one another sisters their relationships were not all equal. Agnes was most happy alone, focusing her thoughts elsewhere even as a client was thrusting above her. Elizabeth showered her affections onto Hal although her heart had never truly mended after the loss of her sister. Maude would have fought to protect any one of their family, although only willing to give her own life for Anne.

The inclination of affections towards other women was not unheard of in brothels as whores saw men at their most shallow and animalistic, however the mutual feelings between the two young women was a state Mary could not fully name. A love different to the admiration kind Mary had felt for Jane, and again to that which was stirred by Hal.

_He never belonged to you_

Mary didn't look to the corner where she knew the apparition still stood. She took the thin blanket off her mattress and twisted it to form a familiar knot. In order to reach the wooden beam in the ceiling she stood on the empty bucket she used as a chamber pot.   

Mary took a deep breath before kicking the bucket out from under her feet.

She watched her body still hanging suspended from the beam. A dark stain  showed that she had fouled herself at the moment of death.

“It isn’t what we were told, is it? Death.” Catherine murmured airily. She pointed to the wall behind Mary. “Go. Find Jane.”

Mary turned to see a door, dark ebony, a faint light glowing from underneath. The door handle was warm to her hand, dissolving into nothing as it closed behind her.

.................................................

Hal’s breath came in weak gasps, the blood soaking his white shirt and onto the damp ground. There were many others around him, one by one failing to hold onto life.

Catherine knew the doors would be formed her in the forest in a long line as each man found the correct passage just as a baby can recognize its mother.  Some glanced back at her, kneeling by her son’s side as she placed her hands over his wound desperately trying to slow the bleeding. 

Her eyes filled with tears, the only substance her body was still able to produce.

“I’m very sorry, young woman, but that will do no good,” said a voice. “He is going to die.”

Catherine looked up. The speaker was dressed in the uniform of a surgeon but he carried no medical tools.

“Please, can’t you do something?” she begged.  “You can see me?”

The man knelt. “Yes, I see you. Is he your lover?”

“My son.”

He looked at her again and nodded. “You are a ghost.”

“What?”

“Ghosts are spirits who have lingered not by choice on earth after death rather than advancing to the next world. They are the first part of a trinity which has existed almost as long as any existing religion. Ghosts can only be seen by higher beings and a very small portion of humanity. That gift has driven many humans into madness while others were hailed as prophets.”

The man lowered his face to determine Hal was still breathing.

“Do you wish to live?” he asked Hal.  The young man moved his head in a weak nod.

“What are you going to do?” Catherine asked as the surgeon closed his eyes and lowered Hal’s collar.

She screamed and grabbed his shoulder as he sank his teeth into Hal’s throat, a trickle of blood running down his chin. 

 

 

Hal opened his eyes. 

A cold hand gently was stroking the sweaty hair off his forehead. The surface beneath his back was a wooden floor, his head cradled in a young woman’s lap.

“Good evening, madam. I apologize...” He tried to sit up, feeling slightly ill.

“Oh Henry,” she sighed.

“How do you know... Have we met previously, Miss...?”

“Catherine.”  She didn't dare say more.

She watched as he ran his hands down  his body, no doubt feeling for signs of the lance wound which had almost killed him.

“My memory vague. Where exactly are we?”

Catherine glanced up at the surgeon.

“Still in Orsha, in my hut roughly two miles from the battlefield to be exact. You were fatally injured, can you remember that?”

“Yes.”

“In order to save your life I have made you into one of my kind; my personal favourite term is a vampire.”

“I feel strange...”

“That’s alright,  confusion is normal. At this point all you will be feeling is thirst and perhaps a dull ache below your skin. This will only get worse with time.”

Hal struggled to pay attention to the surgeon’s words. Creatures such as man-wolves, lingering spirits and the changes to his own body. Immortality outside the teachings of the church...

“If you will pardon the question, what are you doing here, madam? It may still be dangerous-”

“Thank you but I have been dead now over twenty-five years.”

“I am sorry. Much of what I have just heard seems impossible although I don’t doubt it to be the truth.”

 “I do feel thirsty,” Hal swallowed attempting to relive the painful dryness in his mouth.

Catherine moved to stand but the man shook his head.

“Water isn't what he needs.”

After a moment of hesitation he knelt beside Hal and brought his teeth to his own arm.

Hal attached his mouth to the small cut, sucking eagerly like a newborn.

“Small amounts of blood can sustain a vampire but only short term. If you wish to prevent fragility you will need to kill soon.”

Hal moaned, the lower half of his face smeared red. Catherine watched with transfixed horror. 

“Alright, that’s enough,” he snapped, attempting his pull his arm from Hal’s grip. 

The older screamed as the young vampire withdrew and sank his fangs into the exposed throat instead.

Hal pinned him beneath his body and continued to suck greedily, ignoring the struggles and the tearful pleading from the girl in the corner.

Catherine tore her eyes away and ran outside. A new wooden door had formed in mid-air.

She paused, casting a glance back at the cottage.

_He’ll be a good man, I promise_

The words she had heard her sister whisper to her dead body echoed in her ears but no longer held the power to anchor her.

 

 

 

 

 


	6. Clarity in Death

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 1514
> 
> Hal's return home to tie up loose ends

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What Elizabeth suffering from is actually dementia induced by syphilis :/

The grave was simple, nothing more than a pair of iron rods wound with strings of feathers and daisies. Anne knelt with difficulty to place the latest offering: a smooth white stone two small eyes of black quartz.

It had only been through idle gossip that she had learned of her friend’s fate; like plague victims the mass of bodies after the last wave of pestilence had been burned or buried in communal graves. There was no body buried beneath the rustic cross in the hedge beside her house yet Anne felt she needed a small tribute to the woman whose death grieved her more than her own daughters dead within days of each other.

Instincts she still could not disregard informed Anne of the strangers gaze focused on her back before she glanced around.

The young man was standing several paces behind her. 

“It’s good to see you, Anne.”

“I beg your pardon?”

She studied him with her eyes as she rose off her knees slowly, ignoring the assisting hand offered.

The threadbare clothing hanging off his lean frame, she recognised was an army uniform, his dark hair gathering in unruly curls.

“I was eight years old the last time i saw you, the day you left us to marry a man you did not love. You knew I would not be able to fathom why you would choose to do so. I do now.” 

His dark eyes bulged slightly in his thin face as he looked at her pleadingly.

“My god, Hal?”

She threw her arms around him, fresh tears welling in her eyes.

“I wish I could have said goodbye,” she murmured. “I missed you all so much...”

She gasped as she felt movement by her navel.  The expression on his face showed a trace of envy combined with a less familiar emotion.

Anne gently placed his large pale hand on her swollen stomach. The thin cotton of her dress stretched taught against the almost complete globe of an eight month cycle unborn.

After a moment the gentle kicking subsided she removed his hand and took it between both of her own. Laundry duties had dug deep calluses into hers, brittle nails, chipped with dirt and old blood stains.  Although a beard covered the lower half of his face, she noticed his hand to be fairly hairless, also unexpectedly smooth and free from even the small scars acquired in childhood.

His delft fingers caressed the simple gold band around her finger, dull and dirty with age.

“How long has it been now?” he whispered.

“Over eighteen years now. A humble butchers’ wife.”

She knew her chances of carrying a child safely to full term were lessoned; the childbirth would most likely kill her.

He barely listened to Anne talk, watching her discreetly. It had been close to two decades since he last saw her. Her body had been altered by the births of previous children, her breasts grown heavy with milk.

However, the rosy glow gave a youthful grace to her face, as did the way her dark tresses cascaded down her back and framed her face in ebony curtains.  She pushed a loose strand behind her ear as she smiled; the few grey streaks had not diminished her beauty. He allowed his gaze to travel, pausing at a vein in her slender neck

“This child will be my last,” she said softly. “I hope my body can survive one more.”

“Other children? How many?”

“One son. My two daughters were taken by the sweating pestilence, years ago now.” She paused. “Maude outlived Agnes, she fought so hard…”

 Anne grabbed Hal’s shoulders as the young man slumped against her.

“A lot of changes have occurred recently,” he murmured.

Anne blinked as she felt his lips gently caress her throat. She gasped as the tip of his tongue tasted her skin and he drew back hastily.

“I heard the stories. What happened to Jane…Mary and…”

“She’s still alive?”

Anne nodded.

“Hal, whatever she was is gone-”

“Where did they take her? Tell me!” 

“Hal, please...” she croaked.

He looked down at his hands with surprise, one gripping her forearm and the other at her throat.

“I’m sorry, so sorry...”

..............................

The filth and disordered noise was not unfamiliar. Memories of his childhood and the army barracks replayed across the corners of his mind, the stench of filth and decay had remained a constant his entire life. The pungent wave of human waste and unwashed bodies draped around him like the sweaty arm of a father he had never known.

The men groaned and howled, those with the strength crawled to the doors of their cages and rattled the bars. Hal ignored the sounds of lesser creatures suffering and covered his nose with a new kerchief. He covered the small bowl of stew he held with his other hand.

He spread the kerchief on the floor before kneeling as he drew level with the final cell. The stone and iron closet was smaller than the room she had once shared with four other women but not by much. In the dim light her crouched form was cast in shadows leaving only her blistered bare feet and the thick iron shackles on her ankles visible. Beneath the stench he could smell the alluring scent of fresh blood gathering in the gouges on her ankles, the scratches from her own nails and the untreated welts on her back from the lash.

Hal levelled the bowl through the bars, taking care not to spill the rich beef stew.

“Lizzie?” he whispered tentatively.

The woman shuffled further into the corner away from his voice.

 Hal didn’t speak again choosing to allow the smell of meat waft towards the far corner. The frail body, which crawled slowly into the light, was barely more than a frame of bones, the torn and stained shift hanging loosely about her; every expanse of exposed skin was marked with the mysterious rash.

Hal caught a glimpse of the woman he remembered in her eyes, so very like his own, before she narrowed them in suspicion.

“Who are you?”

“You don’t remember me, do you?”  Hal spoke the words aloud more for his own benefit then hers. 

“There is no such thing as a free favour, young man. Offer charity to another whore.”

She pushed the bowl away.

“I am sorry to have offended you as such.”

Hal stood and made to walk away, halting once out of her line of sight but continued to mimic the echo of footsteps.

Elizabeth dipped a hesitant finger into the bowl of offered food and tasted, barely able to contain a moan of pleasure. The few occasions during her childhood that her family had been able afford meat the cheap yet delicious cuts of beef had brought flavour and texture to their watery soup.

 It was one of the only clear memories she still possessed.

She picked up the wooden spoon by the bowl and attempted to eat.

Hal heard her mutter her frustration before throwing away the spoon and drinking from the bowl, paying no heed to the scalding heat.

It began subtly, a slight tremor in her hands and feeling akin to fever as her heart began to pound. Within an hour as the ground hemlock flowed through her, her entire body trembled, drool escaping her breathless mouth as a second wetness stained her dress.

Hal listened as her cries gave way to silence, not because the pain had stopped but because her body had grown so numb and starved of air that she could no longer move or even make a sound.

He ignored the pains in his own legs from standing so long and refused the relief of sitting down.

The hand that caressed his cheek gently was cold but not unpleasantly so, like a chilling breath of wind in spring rather than a frosty bite.

“Thank you.”

Hal raised his head to look at her. Although she showed the signs of natural age, her skin was clean and free from disease, looking more like the woman he remembered. He could only hope she had not looked back at her body as she left it.

“Any child should be happy with so many devoted mothers; none of you ever made me feel like the burden I must have been.”

“Never,” Elizabeth shook her head and held out her arms.

He was taller than she was now yet as Elizabeth embraced him, Hal felt again like the child who had sought comfort time and again in her gentle arms.

“I think I always knew I was yours,” he whispered.

“I’m sorry Hal but you are not my son. Would you like to know the truth?”

She waited before continuing.

“My sister left behind a newborn when she died and it was only with the love and support of Jane, Mary and all the others that I was able to raise him.  She was my world, like you became.”

“What was her name?”

“Catherine.”

.................................

A soft trickle brought his attention from the fading door to the stained floor, grimacing with disgust at a stream of piss spaying onto his shoes.  The gaunt face laughed throatily and barred its teeth before moving to retreat against the wall.

With ease, his hand caught the useless head of hair and slammed it against the iron bars.

Hal did not glance back to see the lunatic’s ghost struggle to open his door.

 

There had not been a single moment, rather a series of events throughout his life until the fundamental point requiring only a gust of wind to dislodge hesitant toes from the cliffs edge.

Hal strode with a newfound freedom in his gait; the clarity of his own naivety and foolhardy morals bringing a curved smile to his lips.

The childish desire to maintain his sense of humanity, to resist the urge to tear apart each person he passed and quench the burning thirst, was gone.

What structure of human life deserved admiration besides the stubborn dominance held over all other species, even separating one another through levels of wealth? What right should demand loyalty be given to laws that had allowed harm to come to innocent women, overseen by a creator who only watched?

_“What was her name?”_

He remembered her face. The girl who had waited by his side as he awoke from the transformation, weak and shaken from the fearful visions played behind his eyelids.   Of course, the pathetic man he had been was unable to tell why her gentle presence had given him a sense of comfort. Perhaps the resemblance to her sister stirring positive emotions, or maybe more instinctive. An unknowing reaction to meeting his...mother.

“Catherine.”  He spoke the name aloud.

It was only natural to find himself once again outside Anne’s home; the lifeless shell of a woman he had once loved held in his arms. It had been easy to smoother her surprise with one hand as she entered the street to throw out the contents of a chamber pot. His teeth tore open her throat before she could draw breath to scream.

Her quick death was not one conducted in mercy, nor was it a rash act of revenge; it simply happened. As he lowered Anne to the ground, he stooped to retrieve the stone from Maude’s monument. The light captured by the black quartz in its smooth white base was quite pretty he noticed, passing the stone the index and middle finger of one hand.

He considered the baby still cradled in her womb.

_How long can an unborn survive once the mother’s heart has stopped beating?_

With the weight of morality lifted from his mind, Hal smiled.


End file.
